There’s a quick way to improve or enhance a relationship.
Very simply, the idea is to catch your partner “doing good.”
Instead of focusing mostly on what you don’t like or what’s not going well, notice things your partner does that you like and verbalize it. In other words, show appreciation. Here’s how to do it.
Get out a pad of paper and pen (or computer if you prefer to type). You’re going to make two lists.
1) The first is a list of everything you can think of that you learned or gained from your parent (mother or father), that you feel has had a positive influence or effect on you.
Stay with just one parent at a time.
Jane is a 44 year-old woman who has been in three abusive relationships. The last one was particularly bad and it took a lot of courage and help to free herself.
Not surprisingly, Jane grew up in a family where her father regularly abused her mother both physically and emotionally. He didn’t physically abuse the children, but he was emotionally abusive to them at times.
If you watch your thoughts over a full day, which by the way I recommend highly, see if you can count the number of times your mind drifts automatically toward observing, evaluating, and/or criticizing someone else’s behavior.
If we’re really honest with ourselves, it happens many times everyday. Why? Because it’s the default habit of the ego to deflect away from itself and focus on someone else.
This may seem like an odd subject to broach because doesn’t everybody already know that personal history is important?
It would seem so, but there’s a trend and push to ignore the past and just deal with the present on it’s own terms. Hmm . . . what do you think?
If you’ve ever read any success literature or listened to CD programs about how to be successful or how to reach your goals, then you’re very likely familiar with the current focus on “practicing gratitude.”
There are many ways to accomplish this including such things as keeping a gratitude journal, writing little notes of gratitude directly to people you want to thank for something, putting up reminders on the wall where you work or in your home that say something about gratitude, posting words of thanks on social media, and so on. There’s no one correct method.
You probably know what I’m going to say from reading the title before I even begin. I say that because I think we’re all familiar with using the words “always” and “never” to describe something, and especially when we’re describing someone else’s behavior.
“You always leave your clothes on the floor in your room. You never admit that you’re wrong. NEVER! She always dresses impeccably. He never eats meat.”
It’s easy to get quite overwhelmed when you have a lot to do, especially if there are timelines involved and your list covers many different areas of your life.
Most of us have work stuff, house stuff, kid stuff, relationship stuff, and any number of other things that come up periodically like getting the oil changed in the car, renewing your auto tag, making brownies for the fund raiser at school, etc. You get the picture.